Confessor: Chainfire Trilogy Part 3

"I've heard mention of it," she said. "Do you finally know what that means?"

"One of the two branches after that crucial fork leads to areas of yet more branches, offshoots, and forks farther on." Nathan flicked his wrist offhandedly, as if indicating those things unseen to anyone but him. "There are a few books of prophecy that I've been able to identify as having to do with issues that lie beyond on that branch. I'm sure that a concerted search would reveal others. So, you might say that down that fork lies the world as we know it."

He tapped the palm of one hand on the railing as he gathered his thoughts. "On the other branch of that mantic root lies only the Great Void. There are no books of prophecy for what lies beyond. That is the reason it is called the Great Void. You might say that there is nothing on that branch for prophecy to see-no magic, no world as we know it, and thus no prophecy to illuminate it!"

He cast her a brief glance. "That is the world the Imperial Order wants. If they take us down that fork, mankind will go forever into the unknown of the Great Void, a place without magic and thus without prophecy.

"Some of my predecessors have speculated that since there is no prophecy for what lies beyond, it could only mean that the Great Void augurs the end of everything, the end of all life."

Nicci could find no words. She didn't think that there could be anything but darkness if the Order won, so this news wasn't really all that surprising to her.

"From the books here that I have been studying, from the information they have given me-and from recent events-I have been able to fix us on the chronology of this prophetic root."

Nicci's gaze darted to the wizard. "Are you sure?"

Nathan held a hand out toward the army below. "Jagang's army being here as they are, surrounding us, is one of a number of events that tells me that we are now on the cardinal root that takes us toward that fateful fork.

"I've known for centuries about the Great Void being in prophecy, but I didn't know if it was significant because I was never sure precisely where it fit in the chronology of prophecy. As far as I knew it was always possible that we might end up following an altogether different arm of the tree of prophecy, never setting foot in the area containing that particular cardinal root with the Great Void.

"There was always the possibility that the Great Void would turn out to be somewhere beyond any one of hundreds of false forks, down a dead branch on the tree of prophecy. Ages ago, when I first started studying it, it had seemed to me that it would turn out to be nothing more than false prophecy, eventually to be left in the forgotten dust of history along with so much of the other dead wood of the possible things that never came to pass.

"Slowly, though, events have inexorably carried us to where we find ourselves today. I am now sure that we are on that trunk of prophecy, on that particular branch, on that cardinal root, about to encounter the determinative fork.

"You," Nathan said to Nicci, "have irrevocably placed us there by putting the power of Orden in play in Richard's name. The boxes of Orden were the final node on the mantic root.

"There is no longer any possibility for mankind but to face that fork."

CHAPTER 17

Cara stuck her head out of the doorway far enough that the wind coming up the walls of the palace lifted her blond braid. "You mean, if Richard takes us down one of those two forks we will survive, but if he doesn't, and we go down the other ..."

"There is only the Great Void," Nathan finished for her. He turned back to Nicci, laying a hand on her shoulder. "Do you understand the significance of what I'm telling you?"

"Nathan, I may not know everything that prophecy has had to say about it, but I certainly know what is at stake. The boxes of Orden were put into play by Sisters of the Dark, after all. I hardly see any outcome should they win except for the end of everything good. As far as I can see, Richard is the only one who has a chance to stop that from happening."

"Quite so," Nathan said with a sigh. "This is why Ann and I have been waiting five hundred years for Richard to come into the world. He was the one meant to navigate the forks that would successfully carry us through a dangerous tangle of shrouded knots within prophecy. If he succeeded, which he has so far done, then he is the one who must lead us in this final battle. We've known that for a long time, now."

Nathan rubbed a finger along the side of his temple. "We've always understood that the boxes of Orden were the final node upon which this cardinal root forks."

Nicci frowned as his words sunk in. She suddenly understood.

"That's where you made the mistake, before," she said, half to herself.

Ann leaned through the doorway a little, her eyes narrowing. "What?"